Finally joined the upgrades club, also some questions

Well after having the X-carve for over a year now and with very minimal problems I decided to bite the bullet and do some upgrades to the machine after I was running into some problems as of late( mostly flex I assume) with the pockets of my carve not coming out as flat as they should be. I squared up the Z axis, I don’t think I’m running the machine too fast, in fact I think I’m running it slower than most people from what I’ve been reading. and still can’t get a relatively flat cut( yes I’ve checked V wheels and no slop in the delrin nut. The other thing is that there is a sag in the middle of the wasteboard which I plan on skimming down but would like to do it when I have everything else set up. Just decided to upgrade and hopefully I will get some improvement.

So I just got the wide maker slide for the x-axis (I had done the 30 minute mod already) and was hoping it will improve rigidity over the 30 min mod. I also ordered the linear Z slide from cnc newbie. I will also be putting in some L brackets on the Y axis’s. and changing out eccentric nuts to spacers.

I just had a few questions for the people who already did some of these upgrades. I’ve been reading as much as I can but haven’t quite found the answers I’m after. I’m still a complete noob when it comes to the machine settings in easel and was wondering once I get the linear Z slide installed if the steps are different because its a direct drive and what the setting would be or where to change that. Also do I have to reverse the wiring on the Z motor because it will be flipped over for the direct drive?

I’m sure I will have more questions as I install this stuff, Sorry about the long post everyone.

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You don’t have to reverse the wires, GRBL can handle that.

In Easel, you’ll go to Machine → Advanced and in the Console, you’ll need to modify five GRBL configurations:

$3 will flip the Z axis direction to go from stock to direct drive. You’ll need to look at your current value and change it according to the GRBL Wiki page:

If you’re already inverted, you’ll need to not invert.

Check this post for the other four: